I exploit the unexpected increase in employment in 1975, 76 and 77 in
the South African homelands to compare the long term adult outcomes of
children whose fathers benefitted from the employment increase to those
who did not. Using a standard difference in difference approach I find
that the shock affected males who were either newborn or in utero at
the time, providing support to the fetal origins hypothesis and showing
the importance of mother’s nutrition. The income increases did not raise
household incomes above the poverty datum line, explaining why older
individuals were not affected. This study provides previously unmeasured
individual level information on the quality of life in the homelands during
apartheid, an era when African living standards were neglected but
unmeasured because of a lack of data collection.